1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an external drive cabinet, and in particular to a drive cabinet that allows a computer to process the data stored in the external disk drive through cable connection between the drive cabinet and the computer.
2. The Related Art
The computer operation is vulnerable to natural and human-caused hazards, such as computer viruses, lightning, and improper operation procedures on the part of the users, all of which can result in loss of valuable data during the operation.
Therefore, it is necessary to keep second copies of the original data in order to prevent data loss. Data can be stored in magnetic disks, CDs, or hard disks. Thanks to the cost-effective solution, the hard disk is still considered as the most important data storage device in computer data processing. To cope with increasing demand for second disks or removable disks, manufacturers put out external drive cabinets to hold the removable disks. The removable disk enables the users to carry their data on their business trips, and data transportation between the office and home.
There are basically two types of external disk drives on the market: standard and multi-function. The standard type is equipped with a universal serial bus (USB) interface, through which the power and data are transmitted to the enclosed hard disk. The multi-function type not only has USB interface, but also creates network drives with high-speed file transfer rate. This allows external disk drives to be directly connected to the computer for on-line data processing, so that multi-media and video applications can be supported, but this multi-functional external disk drive is larger in size and usually comes with a power connector and a data interface connector.
A conventional multi-function external disk drive is comprised of a frame, a cartridge, and a hard disk, where the control circuitry and heat fans are embedded in the drive frame, and a power connector and a data connector are provided at the back of he drive frame. The most common external disk drive comes with a push-pull handle.
The hard disk is normally inserted into the external drive cabinet by pushing in the cartridge holding the hard disk with the power and data connection from the backside of the hard disk and the cartridge. To dismount the hard disk, the cartridge is simply pulled out from the external drive cabinet. It shall be noted that the front panel of the hard disk is usually exposed on the outside even when the disk body is mounted in the external drive cabinet.
However, the mounting and dismounting of the hard disk in a conventional external drive cabinet is usually not that smooth. The power and data connections of the hard disk are arranged side by side at the back of the disk drive and on the same level. Similar configuration is also found on the external drive cabinet, so the connection between the hard disk and the drive cabinet might be so tight that it may take several attempts before the user can yank the hard disk out. The design problem causes the friction of connector walls to culminate at one point, so the force required to separate all connectors at one point is many times greater than a single connector. After removing the hard disk, the connectors or wire connections to the hard disk might be damaged by the sudden jolt.
To overcome the above-mentioned problems, the present invention intends to provide an improved external drive cabinet that makes mounting/dismounting of the hard disk easier.